Almost Innocent Read Free

exercised him considerably. Rooks wheeled and cawed over the crenellated fortress, built for defense not comfort with its four massive towers at each corner. The vast donjon rose in the center of the enclosed space, towering over the working buildings of the compound, throwing its great shadow over the maze of cloisters and inner courtyards.
    A sudden burst of raucous laughter rose above the cawing of the rooks and the background sounds of the fortress at work, the hammer on anvil from the forge, the rattle of harness, the tramp of marching feet from the garrison court. The man on the battlements swung round to look down into the courtyard below. Two pages were engaged in a game of chase, threading their way through the groups of men-at-arms, who jeered or called encouragement, depending on their mood. One of the boys held aloft a velvet cap of the Bellair livery as he dodged the grasping hands of his capless pursuer. Two yellow mastiffs plunged noisily and eagerly into the fray.
    Satisfied that it was but exuberant play, more theresponsibility of the master of pages than his, Lord Bellair was about to turn back to his examination of the horizon when he caught a glimpse of vivid orange hugging the wall of the outer ward.
    His lips thinned in anger. There was only one possible reason she could have had for being there. Mad Jennet’s hut was situated at the furthest extremity of the outer court. For fear of her powers, no one dared banish her from the castle, but she was kept in isolation, visited only by the desperate in their own need or the greatly compassionate in her need.
    The Lord Bellair, his fur-trimmed surcote swaying, strode rapidly down the stone steps, reaching the inner courtyard just as the child emerged through the central archway.
    “Where have you been?” he demanded, although he knew the answer well enough.
    “With mad Jennet, sir,” Magdalen answered. Lying would benefit her nothing.
    Lord Bellair regarded the child with his usual mixture of unease and bewilderment. It was unnatural for an eleven-year-old to find irresistible a filthy crone with her mutterings and incantations. Why was she not as afeard of the witch as he was convinced any other child of her age and upbringing would be? He took in the unspeakable dirt on her smock, the ribbon come loose from the long brown plait, and saw that she held something clenched in her fist.
    “What is that in your hand?”
    Magdalen examined the cobbles at her feet while she tried to decide whether she could keep her secret. But she knew she could not. Slowly, she uncurled her hand, revealing the unsavory little pile on her palm. “It’s a spell.”
    Lord Bellair recoiled. What sort of a child was she that she would dabble in witchcraft in this fashion? Was she so tainted by her birth? He had struggled for eleven years to overcome that taint, and he would try one lasttime. He wanted to take the disgusting, fearsome assortment from her and hurl it to the ground. But he dared not. If there was indeed magic contained within the grouping, he dared not disturb it. The spell must be returned intact whence it came.
    Taking the child’s free hand, he strode with her back into the outer ward and over to mad Jennet’s hut. He pushed through the skin hanging over the doorway and held his breath against the noxious stench. Mad Jennet cackled from the shadows at her visitor.
    “Well, well, my lord. Are you come to visit the mad crone? What can I do for you? Is it a willing wench you’d wish for . . . or the power to enjoy one? That’s long lost to you, I’ll be bound.” Her laughter rustled like sere leaves, mocking.
    They were not words for a child’s ears, and the Lord Bellair’s anger rose with his discomfiture. He shoved the girl forward. “Return those revolting things!”
    Magdalen stepped further into the hut and laid the spell carefully upon the ground. “My thanks, dame, but I may not accept it.”
    Old Jennet offered no response, and Lord Bellair